Integrated circuits are commonly disposed in carrier devices known as sleeves during the late stages of the manufacturing process and thereafter. These sleeves are generally tubular in shape and are constructed of hard, transparent plastic or similar materials.
During final test, marking and other late-stage manufacturing operations, integrated circuits must be removed from these sleeves and individually handled. Most typical handlers are designed so that an operator individually inserts full sleeves at some angle at an input station. The integrated circuits then slide out of the sleeve under the influence of gravity. This not only requires much operator labor to handle the individual sleeves, but is relatively slow. The force of gravity is not sufficient to accelerate the integrated circuits to speeds which are consistent with the high throughput rates desired in current final test and similar operations.
An automated sleeve handler combined with a sleeve unloader which uses a blast of air to eject the integrated circuits from the sleeve is known in the art. Such a system is difficult to use in practice because the repeated, high speed air blasts must be highly muffled in order to accommodate workplace noise restrictions. In addition, the extra facilitization required to accommodate the air supply needs of such a system adds significantly to its cost of use.
A significant hindrance to the development of automated sleeve unloading devices is the requirement of end caps for retaining the integrated circuits within the sleeves. Typical sleeve design allows the parts to easily slide into or out of either end. End caps which typically are inserted into the sleeve ends prevent unwanted escape of parts from the sleeve. Of course, such an end cap must be manually removed prior to automated sleeve handling an re-inserted later.